The Bonds of Blood
by a-mild-looking-sky
Summary: /post DoS/ After his fight with the orcs in Lake-Town, Legolas follows Bolg back into the woods. Knowing his only child is facing the growing orc threat alone, Thranduil is forced to choose between his imposed isolation and the safety of his people or the safety of his son.
1. Chapter 1

**The Bonds of Blood**

**PROLOGUE**

Clawed, mangled, stinking hands ripped and pulled at him, trying to tear straight through to his abused flesh. He was twisted, shoved, jerked between the two of them, great putrid orcs, each wanting to get their sadistic fill of the elf, each craving to bring him down. With sadistic glee, they battled him in front of their master, forcing him in the direction of their outstretched, slashing weapons. He ducked and rolled, continuously evading their blows, but his own sword only met with steel armour. They would push him away, sharpened blades missing his body by a hair's breadth.

A blackened haze of fury had descended upon the outer rims of Legolas' sight. He throbbed with the screaming weight of it, moving as if possessed by a wild, vengeful spirit. The metal of Orcrist flashed and blinded in the starlight, a blur which was only stopped when smashing into its target. He shouted. He screamed. And they laughed.

One grabbed him by the hair, yanking him back into a vicious crush. He panted and struggled fiercely as the breath escaped him. Its arms dug into his ribs and they shrieked with the unnatural pressure. He writhed. One of his elbows dug deep into a weak spot in the orc's protection and he bounded forward.

He went for his sword but the other beast grasped him like a rag doll, squeezing and wrenching his arm. He squirmed, resisting with all his frenzied strength. His heels scraped along wooden planks, searching for purchase.

But then the world span. He was lifted and tossed, crashing, curling into a toppling stack of brimming boxes. They screeched with laughter. A cleaver dashed past his whirling head. Hands tugged at his belt to pull him up.

He slashed one of them off with a furious hack of Orcrist. It was met with a howl, a bubbling sound that intensified and heightened as the other appendage was decimated. Bloody stumps smeared against his tunic. He leapt to his feet, ignoring the tilt of the town about him as he finished the orc's pain in one foul sweep across its open neck. Thick black liquid spurted against him, blinding him, but he turned to the other creature, gasping, whole body vibrating.

The sound of clashes filled the choked air. Wide-eyed, feral, he met the orc's every thrust and swing, dashing the balance of the weapon, striking its momentum. As soon as he was near enough, he rammed a knee into the vermin's gut. It doubled over. He did it again, exposing a tear in the shield upon its back. With a cry, he drove the sword straight into the gap. It burst through the organs beneath, penetrating right to the other side, the tip peeking out of the stomach. The orc wailed. It fell, stone dead, to the ground.

Stained with black blood, Legolas raised the sword once again to meet the two foes' master.

But the street was empty.

He had gone.

And suddenly the world was heaving and pulsing about him.

His head slammed back into a wooden pole as he collapsed gratefully against it. His chest surged and swelled, breath fighting to come out in short, sharp pants. The sword nigh on slipped from his grasp when his knees began to soften beneath him. He coughed, spluttered, wiped the salty perspiration from his trembling lips.

It could hardly have been a minute since he left the dwarves. Hardly a minute since the orcs had ambushed him. Hardly a minute yet an age had seemed to pass.

He forced himself to remain upright, the suffocating fury gradually dissipating. Where was he? What had led him to this orc-ridden place?

Esgaroth, that is where he now found himself, shaking in the aftermath of near death. He had followed Tauriel here, under some petulant delusion that she could handle thirty orcs on her own, flagrantly disobeying the king's orders. The dwarves; they were here also, being harboured in the house of some townsman. That's why she had ventured to the lake - wanting to protect that troublesome company, who had, until mere days ago, been the prisoners of his father. Her heart was far too young, far too impulsive. She should not have left, and neither should he.

But he could not concentrate on that now. He reeked of death, throat clogged with a metallic burn. He leant back his head, saw through slitted eyes the dark forms of orcs leaping from rooftop to rooftop as they retreated from the town. This was no normal invasion. They had been sent here, under one prime objective. And they were coming from somewhere, hordes of them like breeding spiders infecting ever more lands.

The dwarves had brought this upon them.

Or so it seemed.

Slowly regaining his control, he gathered his sword and slid it back into its scabbard. He must return to the woodland realm, face his father's wrath at having left against his word. There was something gathering; more than merely escaped prisoners.

Yet a warm trickle of liquid dripping into his mouth abruptly stopped him from moving. He raised his hand, touched his lips. Crimson painted his pallid skin. No black orc blood. His own. He stared, frozen. Curiosity soon changed to rage.

In the distance, there came the sound of heavy, racing steps. As he glared at the redness seeping through fingers, a figure moved in the periphery of his vision. A warg and rider, clattering through the night, making in the direction of the bridge back into the forest. The master of the orcs he had fought, the one who had disappeared as he destroyed his companions.

It was time to move.

The creature would not retreat so easily back to its venomous, dirty little hole.

Legolas had no thought for his father's words as he acquired the nearest horse he could find, leaping astride it and dashing after the withdrawing orc. The night faded into hazy black around him as he gave chase, the darkness tunnelled into one clear goal. No more blood would be spilt by the hands of these beasts.

(Tbc)

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**aw man I love writing angry, violent legolas xD **

**anyway, I wanted to write this after seeing DoS (which I loved) as I adored the end fight scene with Legolas. I couldn't help thinking of all the ways they might continue his story line in TaBA. So this story is a little speculation on that :)**

**Disclaimer:: as always don't own the characters, just playing about!**

**Feedback always appreciated :) xx **


	2. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER ONE**

The world was a teeming, rushing blur as Legolas tore into the tangled labyrinth of the forest. The hooves of the horse below him, smuggled out from the woodland realm, quickly matched the beat of his heart, pounding unceasingly in his ears, and gaining speed the further they ventured. It soon became the only noise he could hear; everything in these woods was swallowed by its hungry depths, leaving only one or two sounds behind. And in the darkness, it was all eerily distorted, a trick the mind (or unseen forces) liked to play.

He had lived in its boughs for one thousand years though and he knew better than to think it could be dominated or bettered. The elves who resided here tried only to co-exist beside it, never to claim ownership or a higher status. They respected the forest with a wary admiration and nothing, not even a falling leaf, would happen without the king knowing of it.

So, as Legolas returned into its arms, he knew exactly where to tread his horse, how to manoeuvre her through the twisting undergrowth, when to avert her path from the course they followed. It was a relationship of harmony that every elf excelled in. To be one with nature was in their blood.

And that was why these filthy orcs would not last for a moment more between these trees. They desecrated and poisoned everything they touched, like the vermin they were and soon they would be lost to the omnipotent power of Mirkwood. It was futile to resist it.

They would wither in their own arrogance at daring to cross the elven borders.

That was if Legolas did not find them first.

However, minutes after entering into the woods, the orc he had been following disappeared into the bleakness. They were not the most subtle of creatures but soon, not even a trace of his trampling warg feet, or the panting of his heavy breath, could be heard. The black void around Legolas swallowed all in its gaping mouth and it was not long before even the ears of his horse, let alone more distant creatures, were difficult to distinguish. This was the whim of the forest, an unpredictable, tempestuous animal in itself.

But he kept moving, kept galloping over the invisible ground in a direction which he let his elven senses dictate. It was not the first time he had to rely on something less tangible than the mortal world about him. He concentrated, even as they raced along, and allowed his thoughts to open up, all encumbering decisions vanishing. Only the will of the natural elements around him (though veiled they may be) guided him through the darkness.

And, soon, he was rewarded by a faint, but gradually growing, change of smells about him. The heady musk of the woodland began to fade and its sweet perfume was replaced by a far more distasteful scent: pungent, rotting flesh and perpetual wounds. It could only mean one thing - he was gaining ground on the lone orc, creeping up on his retreating back.

What he would do with him when he finally reached him he was not entirely sure. His duty to the realm instructed that he should take him back to his father - after all, this one did not appear to be just another foot soldier. But the blood boiling furiously in his veins at the havoc they had wreaked upon his home and Esgaroth was quickly swaying his heart. He did not trust in his own control that he could come before this beast and have the coolness to merely take him prisoner. Not when he could still smell his own blood lingering in the air.

Suddenly, somewhere in the vastness before him, there was a flash of dull white dashing between vegetation. He snapped his head immediately in its direction, trying to determine the distance and speed of it in the fleeting moment he had. Though the labyrinth of vines and leaves obscured most of its movements, he saw plainly that it must have been the orc. No other creature of this forest could be so lumbering and heavy. Despite himself, he smiled. There would be no chance to escape his perception now.

So, driving his heel further into the tight flanks of the horse, he sped faster into the night, heatedly tracking the trampled road. It would not be long until he came face to face with this wretched commander again.

And then he would determine if he was worthy enough to be taken prisoner.

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Even though they were sealed in by their thick, cavern walls, Thranduil felt the night as it fell around them. He knew when it was morning, he knew when it was noon, he knew when it was evening; there was not much that passed the woodland king's attention. It was a quality he was both feared and heralded for. No one dared to try and outwit him or his eerie senses for their own safety and dignity.

But, when a guard had come rushing up over the carven paths to his dais hours ago, Thranduil had known something had slipped his eye. He watched him hurry with a momentary clenching in his heart before forcing it down out of sensibility. He merely stared at the elf as he advanced closer, not being able to help noticing the concern and worry in his face. There was only one thing that could mean. Only one thing that this messenger would possibly say.

He watched him bow, grovelling apologetically, when he reached the floor before his throne. Even as he started to speak, he did not raise his eyes, did not venture to look upon the king with these tidings. "My Lord," he uttered breathlessly. "I regret to be the one that gives you this information, I wish it was not so, but -"

"Legolas has left, has he not?"

Thranduil's words made the guard raise his head in surprise. His brow furrowed in an image of sympathy and he nodded. Thranduil sighed, anger rising as quickly as a flooded river within him. It had only been a short time since he had expressly forbidden anyone to leave the realm. These orders were established for a reason; they were not merely spouted because of superficial whims, no matter how much Legolas and Tauriel made them appear or how much they -

Tauriel.

Thranduil narrowed his eyes as the realisation quickly came over him. Legolas must have been swayed by her, convinced to follow in her rebellious stead. In the days that had preceded their escape, she had taken an unnatural interest in the dwarves; her feelings of intrigue and treacherous sympathy had hardly been veiled. It was obvious that she looked on them with a kindred heart. And now that the orcs had followed them into Esgaroth...

The king leant forward to the guard as another wave of fury crashed down upon him, unpredictable, volatile. He flinched a little, tilting his head back out of range. "And I suppose Captain Tauriel has also taken her leave of us?" Thranduil hissed to him. "I suppose she has also neglected her duties to the realm?"

The elf again nodded. "Yes, my Lord. She left not long before the Prince."

Thranduil sat back, breathing out harshly in what sounded eerily like a sardonic chuckle. He curled his hand about one of the spikes of his throne, squeezing it in his palm. "I guessed correctly," he said, averting his gaze to the strong, carven pillars surrounding the chamber. Stretching as far as the eye could see, they were symbols of the kingdom's fortitude and endurance. Many centuries had passed with Thranduil as its ruler and he had done everything in his power to protect it and keep its people safe, as his father had striven to do. But now these dwarves, and these orcs trailing them, had abused his beautiful lands and Legolas and Tauriel were testing every nerve of his patience. In nigh on a thousand years, hardly anyone had strayed from this realm yet in one day, they had lost far too many.

"My Lord," the guard's voice suddenly broke into his reveries. He looked away from the pillars and stone and down into questioning, concerned eyes. This elf was young, Tauriel's age or even more youthful; he did not truly understand the ways of the world yet. There was so much more to learn. "Shall I assemble a party to look for the prince and the captain, sire? Their journey was directed towards Esgaroth. They cannot be far away."

Thranduil paused a moment before shaking his head. He ignored the guard's barely concealed frown as he said, "nay, do not. You said it yourself - they cannot be far away. And they will be armed - no harm will come to them. Soon both will realise the folly of their ways and return."

But that had been hours ago and still Thranduil sat upon his throne, staring down the curving pathways towards the main gate. The day descended into night around the palace yet not a sign of Legolas or Tauriel came to him. He paced, he strutted, he roamed his dais like some wild animal trapped in a cage and no one except from his personal wardens came near him. All knew that when the prince and the captain returned, his wrath would be unfathomable. It was not something any desired to awaken prematurely.

But, when the king had finally finished his impatient walking, and he ascended again to his antlered seat, the stillness he exuded was almost as terrible. He became as frozen as an ever-watchful sentinel, only the occasional flickering of his icy eyes a sign of life within. In silence, he waited, a tense, unpleasant, fuming silence, and not a sound escaped him; not a sound but one statement, whispered forlornly some time in the heavy evening to the oaken pillars about the chamber:

"It is troublesome enough to be father to an entire kingdom. But far more troublesome to be father to an unruly, wayward child."

(tbc)

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**Hey there! I'm so sorry this took so long to update. Thank you all so much for the reviews and follows and faves - it means a lot! I try and respond to you all but unfortunately, I can't respond to the guests. I wish I could as you left some lovely comments as well :)) So I'm just going to thank you all, I love you xxx **

**I will try and update a bit quicker next time. I struggled with writing this one - especially the Thranduil part - and I hope it reads alright but next chapter and beyond, it gets a bit more interesting :)**

**(Btw this is 'chapter one' as technically the first chapter I put on here was a prologue!) **

**feedback is always, always appreciated! x **


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